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Bodleian Library

Heritage attraction
Bodleian Library
Photo: N Chadwick, Wikimedia Commons · CC BY-SA 2.0 · Original Geograph photograph · Report the wrong picture

What is recorded here

The Bodleian Library grew from a medieval university reading room into one of Britain's great research libraries, entitled to receive every book published in the country.

Read the whole record

The Bodleian Library grew from a medieval university reading room into one of Britain's great research libraries, entitled to receive every book published in the country.

Why it was built

Oxford built the first library above the Divinity School in the fifteenth century, and Thomas Bodley restored and enlarged it from 1598.

People and work

Bodley, librarians, scholars and many donors built collections that drew readers from across the world.

How it changed

New wings, underground stores and nearby library buildings answered constant growth while old rooms remained at the centre of the service.

What survives

Duke Humfrey's Library, the old quadrangle, reading rooms, book stacks and links to later buildings survive in use.

Why it mattered

It matters because centuries of collecting and public scholarship are held together in buildings made continuously useful rather than frozen in time.

Sources for this account

Sources checked 16 August 2026.

From OpenStreetMap (© OpenStreetMap contributors) r62123

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Mapped access (17 October 2026)
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Photo credits
  • Betty Longbottom, Wikimedia Commons · CC BY-SA 2.0
  • Philip Halling, Wikimedia Commons · CC BY-SA 2.0
  • Alan Iwi, Wikimedia Commons · CC BY-SA 2.0
  • AJD, Wikimedia Commons · CC BY-SA 2.0
  • Bill Nicholls, Wikimedia Commons · CC BY-SA 2.0
  • N Chadwick, Wikimedia Commons · CC BY-SA 2.0
  • David Smith, Wikimedia Commons · CC BY-SA 2.0
  • Charles Ricketts, Wikimedia Commons · Public domain
  • Raymond Knapman, Wikimedia Commons · CC BY-SA 2.0
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